Airlines prepare for Thanksgiving travel rush

Sarkis joined SmarterTravel in 2003. She's always on the lookout for authentic local experiences and her next great meal. She loves discovering new destinations, predicting trends, and turning amazing travel experiences into inspiring stories.

Her stories have also appeared online at USA Today, Conde Nast Traveler, Yahoo! Travel, Huffington Post, Business Insider, and other publications. Her work has also been published in Spain from a Backpack and The Best Women's Travel Writing 2008. She is currently working on a travel memoir.

As we all know only too well, this has not been a good year for on-time performance or customer service, so it’s good to see some preventive measures now. The ATA predicts four percent more travelers this Thanksgiving than last, and flights will be 90 percent (as opposed to the average 80 percent) full.

To improve the holiday travel experience, many airlines will hire more employees, expand online check-in capabilities, and add more self-check-in kiosks. Airlines are also being encouraged by the ATA to block out seats on popular routes to accommodate passengers whose flights are cancelled due to weather issues, and to waive change fees for passengers who need to change flights due to weather.

A few airlines, including American, Delta, and Northwest, have already come out with holiday travel assurances or plans. Now we just hope for good weather, since the airlines can plan all they want (and I’m glad to see them taking the issue seriously), but the best laid plans will be grounded just like the planes in the event of a big storm.

Trending on Smarter Travel

SmarterTravel.com is a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for sites to earn advertising fees by advertising and linking to Amazon.com. SmarterTravel.com also participates in the SkimLinks and SkimWords affiliate programs.